WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.690 align:middle line:90% 00:00:00.690 --> 00:00:01.740 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:00:01.740 --> 00:00:04.350 align:middle line:90% So nice to see you all. 00:00:04.350 --> 00:00:07.170 align:middle line:84% This is the first of our Prose Series events 00:00:07.170 --> 00:00:11.220 align:middle line:90% to be exclusively alum-driven. 00:00:11.220 --> 00:00:12.330 align:middle line:90% These are all alums. 00:00:12.330 --> 00:00:14.940 align:middle line:84% I see a lot of alums in the audience tonight. 00:00:14.940 --> 00:00:18.480 align:middle line:84% Let this be a spur to you and your work, to get the book out. 00:00:18.480 --> 00:00:20.970 align:middle line:84% And let us know, because we'd like to bring in more alums 00:00:20.970 --> 00:00:23.940 align:middle line:90% back to the program to read. 00:00:23.940 --> 00:00:27.300 align:middle line:84% So first, I'd like to welcome you all to our second Prose 00:00:27.300 --> 00:00:30.540 align:middle line:90% Series event of the semester. 00:00:30.540 --> 00:00:31.650 align:middle line:90% I'm Ander Monson. 00:00:31.650 --> 00:00:33.900 align:middle line:84% As Hannah mentioned, I'm director of the Prose Series, 00:00:33.900 --> 00:00:36.780 align:middle line:84% and tonight we host three fiction writers, one of whom 00:00:36.780 --> 00:00:38.940 align:middle line:90% has gone astray. 00:00:38.940 --> 00:00:41.532 align:middle line:84% So let me first invite you to one more event. 00:00:41.532 --> 00:00:42.990 align:middle line:84% We are having out-- the MFA program 00:00:42.990 --> 00:00:46.110 align:middle line:84% is hosting a little homecoming event for the EXO roasting 00:00:46.110 --> 00:00:50.280 align:middle line:84% company next Friday, which is 403 North 6th Avenue. 00:00:50.280 --> 00:00:53.670 align:middle line:84% It's at their workspace that's attached to it, so Friday 00:00:53.670 --> 00:00:54.922 align:middle line:90% night at 7 o'clock. 00:00:54.922 --> 00:00:56.880 align:middle line:84% We didn't know it was homecoming, but like, oh, 00:00:56.880 --> 00:00:57.600 align:middle line:90% it's homecoming. 00:00:57.600 --> 00:00:58.770 align:middle line:90% So we should do something. 00:00:58.770 --> 00:01:00.840 align:middle line:84% So those of you who are MFA alums, please 00:01:00.840 --> 00:01:03.210 align:middle line:90% come by and say hello. 00:01:03.210 --> 00:01:06.540 align:middle line:84% Have a snack, and have a drink, and come see Tucsonan Ela 00:01:06.540 --> 00:01:10.770 align:middle line:84% Harrison, and MFA alums Paco Cantú, and Kati Standefer, 00:01:10.770 --> 00:01:13.020 align:middle line:84% who all have essays in this year's edition of the Best 00:01:13.020 --> 00:01:17.328 align:middle line:84% American Essays, edited by Jonathan Franzen. 00:01:17.328 --> 00:01:19.620 align:middle line:84% So we'll have books for sale there, thanks to Antigone. 00:01:19.620 --> 00:01:21.810 align:middle line:84% And we'd like to invite all of our alums 00:01:21.810 --> 00:01:23.490 align:middle line:84% and anyone else, which is you guys, who 00:01:23.490 --> 00:01:25.115 align:middle line:84% are interested to come check in with us 00:01:25.115 --> 00:01:28.260 align:middle line:84% and hear three Best American essayists read from three Best 00:01:28.260 --> 00:01:29.790 align:middle line:90% American Essays. 00:01:29.790 --> 00:01:32.220 align:middle line:84% So our readers tonight, in order, 00:01:32.220 --> 00:01:35.310 align:middle line:84% are Lawrence Lenhart, introduced by some chump, 00:01:35.310 --> 00:01:38.610 align:middle line:84% Ben Rybeck introduced by the excellent Buzz Poverman, 00:01:38.610 --> 00:01:42.420 align:middle line:84% and Natasha Stagg introduced by the fabulous Aurelie Sheehan. 00:01:42.420 --> 00:01:44.040 align:middle line:84% So as Hannah mentioned, we're going 00:01:44.040 --> 00:01:49.055 align:middle line:84% to skip the Q and A. The only answer you need is the books. 00:01:49.055 --> 00:01:51.180 align:middle line:84% But if you need more answers, you can buy the books 00:01:51.180 --> 00:01:52.260 align:middle line:90% and harass the writers. 00:01:52.260 --> 00:01:53.880 align:middle line:90% That's fine too. 00:01:53.880 --> 00:01:57.420 align:middle line:84% So as to minimize confusion in introducing the introducers, 00:01:57.420 --> 00:02:00.900 align:middle line:84% I'm the chump who's introducing Lawrence Lenhart. 00:02:00.900 --> 00:02:02.858 align:middle line:84% And this way, I don't need to introduce myself. 00:02:02.858 --> 00:02:05.400 align:middle line:84% And I can do my introduction and get to the good stuff, which 00:02:05.400 --> 00:02:07.260 align:middle line:90% is Lawrence Lenhart. 00:02:07.260 --> 00:02:10.289 align:middle line:84% He's one of my favorite students of all time, not just 00:02:10.289 --> 00:02:12.630 align:middle line:84% for his exceptionally obsessive personality, 00:02:12.630 --> 00:02:15.850 align:middle line:84% and his prodigious and possibly amphetamine-enhanced work 00:02:15.850 --> 00:02:16.350 align:middle line:90% ethic. 00:02:16.350 --> 00:02:17.190 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:02:17.190 --> 00:02:19.770 align:middle line:84% I seem to remember his novel, which was at this point, 00:02:19.770 --> 00:02:21.750 align:middle line:90% I think, at least 500 pages. 00:02:21.750 --> 00:02:24.150 align:middle line:84% And I suggested he might want to cut it, I don't know, 00:02:24.150 --> 00:02:27.990 align:middle line:84% in half, which seemed to resist his attempt to trim it, 00:02:27.990 --> 00:02:31.200 align:middle line:84% that over the weekend added another 300 pages that he 00:02:31.200 --> 00:02:32.730 align:middle line:90% brought back to me. 00:02:32.730 --> 00:02:34.830 align:middle line:84% You failed in your attempt to do that, 00:02:34.830 --> 00:02:37.020 align:middle line:84% but it was a very Lawrence Lenhart moment. 00:02:37.020 --> 00:02:39.690 align:middle line:84% But he's also become one of my favorite writers because 00:02:39.690 --> 00:02:41.430 align:middle line:90% of his doggedness. 00:02:41.430 --> 00:02:45.030 align:middle line:84% He's willing to follow ideas and leads that are seemingly so 00:02:45.030 --> 00:02:50.070 align:middle line:84% embarrassing, unpromising, unwise, or illegal, that most 00:02:50.070 --> 00:02:52.650 align:middle line:84% other saner writers, at most, get 00:02:52.650 --> 00:02:55.320 align:middle line:84% a few sentences deep before giving up on them, and closing, 00:02:55.320 --> 00:02:57.630 align:middle line:84% and then deleting the Word file, and deleting 00:02:57.630 --> 00:02:59.280 align:middle line:84% the application in Microsoft Word, 00:02:59.280 --> 00:03:00.600 align:middle line:90% and wiping their hard drive. 00:03:00.600 --> 00:03:01.890 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:03:01.890 --> 00:03:04.290 align:middle line:84% But Lawrence does not give up there, to his credit, 00:03:04.290 --> 00:03:07.500 align:middle line:84% or maybe he's just not technically sophisticated. 00:03:07.500 --> 00:03:10.110 align:middle line:84% In his fiction, and increasingly his nonfiction, 00:03:10.110 --> 00:03:12.000 align:middle line:90% he goes all the way. 00:03:12.000 --> 00:03:15.630 align:middle line:84% Some might call this a flaw, but to me it's a feature. 00:03:15.630 --> 00:03:19.260 align:middle line:84% Yes, the world needs that essay about dog fellatio, 00:03:19.260 --> 00:03:21.290 align:middle line:90% and shame, and memory. 00:03:21.290 --> 00:03:23.040 align:middle line:84% They need it to get written and published, 00:03:23.040 --> 00:03:26.130 align:middle line:84% and be out there vibrating intensely and permanently 00:03:26.130 --> 00:03:27.060 align:middle line:90% in the world. 00:03:27.060 --> 00:03:29.520 align:middle line:84% We need the weird, super fussy, visual essay 00:03:29.520 --> 00:03:31.800 align:middle line:84% about turtle carapaces, and the one 00:03:31.800 --> 00:03:33.870 align:middle line:84% he's working on now about island nations 00:03:33.870 --> 00:03:37.140 align:middle line:84% sure to be eventually engulfed by water, thanks to climate 00:03:37.140 --> 00:03:40.410 align:middle line:84% change, that's inexplicably concretely in the form, 00:03:40.410 --> 00:03:42.270 align:middle line:84% typographically, of the shorelines 00:03:42.270 --> 00:03:43.740 align:middle line:84% of those islands, as he explains, 00:03:43.740 --> 00:03:45.330 align:middle line:84% which seems really difficult to do. 00:03:45.330 --> 00:03:47.700 align:middle line:84% But that's a kind of Lawrence Lenhart joint. 00:03:47.700 --> 00:03:50.400 align:middle line:84% I mean that we need our artists like Lawrence, 00:03:50.400 --> 00:03:54.990 align:middle line:84% the one for whom no idea seems too bad to make it good. 00:03:54.990 --> 00:03:56.550 align:middle line:90% And I mean, not just good. 00:03:56.550 --> 00:03:59.680 align:middle line:84% I mean to make it really great, which is what he does. 00:03:59.680 --> 00:04:03.230 align:middle line:84% So let us welcome back Lawrence Lenhart.